MANILA, Philippines — Airport personnel of the Bureau of Immigration (BI) were ordered Thursday to be on alert for the possible deployment of undocumented overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) by human trafficking syndicates and illegal recruitment following the current influx of returning OFWs from troubled countries.
BI Commissioner Ronaldo Ledesma also directed personnel at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) and other airports to strictly enforce a ban on the departure of overseas Filipino workers to Libya, Yemen and Bahrain due to ongoing anti-government protests in those countries.
Ledesma alerted immigration officers to be on the lookout for travelers who might be bound for the said countries disguised as tourists.
He also exhorted immigration officers not to relax their guard and stop the departure of victims of illegal recruitment and human trafficking to other countries.
“See to it that the travel ban is strictly implemented. We should not put our OFWs in harm’s way,” Ledesma said in a memorandum to lawyer Maria Antonette Bucasas, chief of the BI airport operations division.
The BI chief issued the directive following instructions from President Benigno Aquino III to the bureau. The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) earlier issued a travel advisory urging Filipinos to defer non-essential and non-urgent travels to Libya, Yemen and Bahrain until the security situations in those countries have stabilized.
Bucasas, for her part, said she already instructed all immigration supervisors and duty officers to strictly enforce the travel ban.
“We have alerted our immigration personnel at the NAIA and other ports nationwide to offload OFWs who intend to travel to Libya, Bahrain and Yemen until such time that the political situation in those countries normalize,” Bucasas said.
The government has been evacuating troubled OFWs especially those in Libya where clashes have escalated between forces loyal and opposed to the government of Muammar Gadhaffi.
source: manila bulletin
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